


Our lost love

by Rinrinreira



Category: Rhett & Link
Genre: Angst and Feels, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-10
Updated: 2020-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-01 00:00:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 617
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23095969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rinrinreira/pseuds/Rinrinreira
Summary: How would their relationship be different if they had different beliefs?
Relationships: Rhett McLaughlin/Link Neal
Comments: 5
Kudos: 26





	Our lost love

**Author's Note:**

> Just a short angsty piece that I wanted to put out after listening to Our Lost Years. Disclaimer - I only listened to the first podcast and their post series interview. :P

Link sat unmoving in his chair when they ended the Ear Biscuits. He felt drained, drained of everything. Empty. 

"You okay buddy?" Rhett asked, concerned. He'd seen the dark clouds looming over his best friend's face as they were closing the last episode of their Lost Years series. He knew that this would be an emotionally challenging task, especially for his friend who accessed his feelings more readily than he did. 

There was no response for a few heavy seconds. Link's head hung low. Rhett sat patiently, giving his friend the time and space he knew he needed. 

"Rhett." 

When Link finally spoke, it was in a cracked voice. Rhett would have missed the first of the tears that were hidden from his view had he not looked at the desk as an almost imperceptible drop fell onto it. 

"Did we lose the greatest love of our lives to the church?" Link looked up at his friend, the desperation of his question evident in his red rimmed eyes. "What have we done? Where would we be if we didn't deny our love so vehemently all these years?" 

Rhett's heart skipped a beat. They had never confronted their love so openly, even though it had been so obvious and so tangible for almost as long as they'd known each other. They'd done their best to force it into the mold of friendship, even brotherly love, over the long years. In the joint faith of their early lives, they'd both arrived on their own at the unanimous belief that the love they felt for each other, which was way beyond any love for a friend, a brother, was a sin. Proof of their human weakness and need for divine redemption. 

But in their later life, as they had each come to their unified realization of the bubble that they had been living in in the past, they had also started to accept the true nature of what they felt for each other. And the weight of having crushed that with their own hands hung heavily on each of their minds. Unspoken until this moment. 

"It would have been the one, greatest love of our lives. And now we will never know what that could have been like," Link continued in a whisper, reaching out to grip his friend's arm tightly. 

Pain shot through Rhett at his words. The very same thoughts he had that he'd shoved right to the back of his mind had been ripped out and verbalised. He looked at Link, his thin frame looking even more frail now. All he could see was defeat, and despair from the tight grip he held on him. 

No, he cannot let this be the conclusion of their friendship, their love. Even if he had to lie to himself, he had to do it for their sake. He would not allow their missed love to be a mistake - he could not, not when it meant their whole lives would have been a mistake. That would crush Link forever, if it did not crush him first. 

He closed his eyes, willing himself to believe the next words that he was about to say. Wrapping his arms tightly around his friend's trembling frame, he whispered softly in his ear, "No, Link. Because of what we did, we now have the two greatest loves in our lives - we have each other, and we have our wives. We have double of what we could have had." 

Link drew a shaky breath. "ls that true? Is that really what we have, Rhett?" 

"Yes, do you trust me Bo?" 

"I trust you…" 

"Thank you," Rhett breathed, pressing a tender kiss to the top of Link's head. 


End file.
